


Between burnt patches

by Casjuice



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Bleeding Out, Death, Declaration of Love, Destiel - Freeform, M/M, Vignette, dying, figurative, hella angsty, sort book thief style death narration, very visual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-28
Updated: 2014-09-28
Packaged: 2018-02-19 03:14:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2372480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Casjuice/pseuds/Casjuice
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Death has come for Castiel.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Between burnt patches

This case is the kind I get only once every millennia; It is rare.

So picture this, if you will.

An angel.

Wings; long, worn, vast in their ethereal dark.

The wings are stretched- like somehow refined strokes of an expensive, black pen. They are jagged around the edges, sketched.

At the centre of these drawings; a man. Neither young or old, neither dead or alive. 

Skin neither pallid or dark, yellowed like old pages, yet blue like the corpse.

He is a midpoint in many senses of the word.

Literally in that he droops in the centre of the monolithic wings, in that he is at a middle age, between life and death, in that his paleness meets a darkness and his yellow meets a blue.

But this role of the middle man is upheld in what he has done to lead up to this.

Perhaps, if the angel had not remained in the middle, unable to choose sides, to stay with the humans or with the angels, he would not be between the wings, caught in the middle of his life, on the threshold of a doorway to somewhere he had never been.

Red is blossoming from his neck, his sides, his arms, hands, legs, back; a beautiful bloom of vibrant colour. As it swirls around him, upon him, within him; his position shifts; the platform is tilted ever so gently and he begins to slip on the slick of it. Towards the blue, the death, a special kind of dark.

Thoughts form in his head but really what is the point of thoughts in this place? In his teetering state? What point is there in the undecided trying to decide once the damage has already been dealt?

Away from this thought now, take my hand. 

Step back.

The perfect image of the midpoint is now obstructed.

A foremost figure. 

A decided one.

A righteous man who believes himself the opposite.

See him scramble, watch, an ant over the tarmac of the angel’s wings; aiming himself at the man who is drifting from the middle.

Picture him, carefully now, picture the expression. The broken vase; the roses and water gushing from the cracks. Hear his shattered sounds. The crying of a faun to its roadkill mother.

Hear them ricochet off eachother, off ears that weep scarlet and eyes that see nothing despite how wide they are opened, how hungrily they reflect that which crowds around them.

The righteous man is perhaps, the one to blame; the one who broke the hourglass and is now watching its precious sand slip between his fingers.

His grip, you see, was too strong.

He liked the angel too much.

He wouldn’t admit it, you know, that he loved him. You can try asking, but he won’t open his mouth to let the words slither out. He’ll keep those mists pent up inside, knotted in heartstrings and heavy in the lungs and the pit of the stomach.

There were times when he felt it flutter in his throat, build up in the dark space behind his teeth. Once when the angel waited for him in the vacant space by a lonely road; chilled by the winter air, alone. He had smiled at a shaken Dean, had been there for him like countless times before.

Dean felt the words somewhere between his heart and his mouth, but they got stuck there when he forced them away.

They bled back into his blood and all he could say was “Don’t ever change”

The angel would, though. Perhaps he wouldn’t have if Dean had said what he meant. Maybe he could have taken that step to take a side.

But he didn’t. So he slides.

So he smears.

“Castiel” speech amongst the shards spat from the man’s mouth, “Castiel remember…”

Dean Winchester won’t be able to get the words out, he’ll let the memory drown in salt water and spasms of the lungs. But we don’t need his vocal chords to hear it. Listen to his thoughts.

_Castiel remember the time, that day you fought me in the dark, remember the days you fought through dark to get me. Remember how we dart between warm and cold; between hating and caring. Don’t you leave, don’t slip away. Stay here._

It’s no more than a wish. A plea. Press your ear to the wall of his skull.

_Remember how I reminded you who you were when you lost your grace, remember how I searched for you when you got lost; remember when I found you. That was one of the only times I held you, Castiel, do you remember? If you wake up, Castiel, if you slide back, there can be more of them. There can be so many more of them._

Outwardly, the vase is shattered entirely, its contents poured over the angel’s chest. Adding to the vibrant colours, Dean is weeping.

“I-“

See that smoke catch on his lungs.

“I can’t…”

See it choke him.

The middle man is way past the middle now, the trail he leaves is magnificent but pitiful; a smudged line of brilliant reds and blacks, swirling tendrils of light, of grace. His hand dips over the edge.

Testing the water, perhaps; if you’re an optimist.

The point of deciding is, as I mentioned before, long since passed.

Echoes in the angel’s veins are just that, the last echoes in a chasm; faint. They drive cautiously through those tiny corridors and highways, the gas meter reads empty.

The place they drive to is not one I frequent, I’m more like the guide. I carry people to the door and give them the nudge through its veil.

Do not ask me what is on the other side.

Even if I knew, I wouldn’t tell. Imagining is so much better.

Imagining.

That’s all the overseer can do now; he can’t speak, face buried deep and desperately in the red ridges of Castiel’s shirt.

Or is the red Castiel’s torn flesh.

Whichever you prefer.

Dean Winchester is picturing Castiel, free of his red waterfalls and drawn on wings. He sees him tilt his head, confused; he sees him holding a badge the wrong way up, he sees  
him nervous in a brothel, he sees him throw a flaming bottle at the devil, he sees him holding up a box of “sorry”, a bag of honey, he sees him sane; he feels him in his arms. Warm, solid, Castiel; not this drenched skeleton.

Dean pictures him doing things he has never seen Castiel do. He sees him reading. He sees him in a cinema. He sees him lying by the seaside. He sees him help Dean fix the impala. 

He sees him laying under covers; a gentle smile on his lips, hair messy and hand beckoning.

I find it hard to watch these imagined scenarios, they are harder than the dying. Sadder. Full of regret and things that will now never be. But they should. 

Come on, let the words out while they may still reach him.

“Cas I-“ His voice is the shaking of a rattle snake’s tail, “I…”

The whole arm dips into the water now; the head is soon to follow.

“I l-“

A final breath.

The middle man falls.

The door slams shut; Castiel cannot hear .

“I love you”


End file.
